The North Sea separates Great Britain from mainland Europe. It has a reputation for nasty conditions – strong storms can blow in from the Atlantic, the tidal currents sweeping north and south are considerable, and the shallow depths make the wind chop short and steep.
But as we’ve found nearly everywhere we’ve sailed, the weather window we pick has a larger impact on conditions than a place’s reputation. We were lucky enough to have a forecast of a steady 10-20 knots of breeze from the southwest, and our crossing in the narrower southern section of the North Sea meant that the trip would only be ~150nm, or a single overnight.
The weather turned out to follow the forecast nearly exactly and Madrone and crew enjoyed the conditions, broad reaching at 7 knots through the night. While the weather and sea state weren’t a challenge, the traffic and obstacles were. The North Sea is the major thoroughfare for shipping from Northern Europe to anywhere else in the world, so there are numerous busy shipping lanes and Traffic Separation Schemes to negotiate. And much of the energy that fuels the UK and Europe is generated in the North Sea – as soon as we passed one giant wind farm, we seemed to encounter the next set of oil platforms.
The traffic and obstacles kept our attention during the night watches, and by morning we pulled up to the dock in Den Helder, Netherlands. Madrone is back in Europe!
